Monday, July 29, 2013

One last preview of Donner Dinner Party, before it comes out next month. This is from the back of the book. Every member of the Donner Party is here. The darkened squares are the ones who didn't make it. Follow the key at the top to find out how they died.

Yesterday, we got our first review for DONNER DINNER PARTY, care of the San Francisco Chronicle!

Heading up to Tahoe on Interstate 80? A tidy graphic novel recounts the mess at the summit in the winter of 1846-47. Quick summary: Things go from bad to worse for a wagon train headed from Illinois to California, and there is nothing left to eat but each other. The narrator is Revolutionary War hero Nathan Hale, who foresees another gruesome chapter in American history right before the British hang him in 1776. (With the same name as the real-life author, he ties together the "Hazardous Tales" series.) Although it's based on somber truths, irreverence rules with Mad magazine edge and snarky asides. Still, the main themes are intact: arduous journey, bad choices, hubris, hunger, cold and an infamous end.

Tuesday, July 23, 2013

The world has landed on me this month. I have a positively crushing deadline with Hazardous Tales #4, and a few new things have been added to the stack. One you'll find out about this week, the other (and it's very cool) will be announced later this year.

Wednesday, July 17, 2013

Boy, oh boy. It's been a busy couple of weeks. Busy weeks lead to spotty posts. I'm deep in crunch time for Hazardous Tales #4--that's the WWI one.

This week we've been working on the cover. Each Hazardous Tales book has a different set of flags on the mast head. When you are doing a WORLD war, you can't just have two flags--you need a whole bunch. Here we have the Allied Powers on one side (US, Russia, France, and UK) and the Central Powers on the other (Ottoman Empire, Austria-Hungary, and Germany). In all fairness, the US flag should be the one in the back, they didn't join in until the end, but we always have the stars and stripes up front on the cover, so it'll have to stand as is.

The pacing on DIGGY SHARK must seem positively GLACIAL. Picture books are a fast read, when you chop them down to a page a day it gets slooooooooow. Already in this post there have been three times as many words as there are in the entire DIGGY SHARK story.

Wednesday, July 3, 2013

Monday, July 1, 2013

Joining This Hazardous Week and Hazardous Holidays, we have a new feature on the Hazardous Tales blog: Hats of History! The Provost is running the show on this one and he's very excited about these hats!